Love Me, Love My DogSource: The Aldine, Vol. 8, No. 11 (1877), pp. 337-338Published by:Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20637426 .

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THE ALDINE. 337

be in the household. It must be an exceedingly ill

painted '' Madonna and Child," or other '' baby piece,"

which does not command from the multitude some

recognition at least. If it have defects of execution visible to the critical eye, the probabilities are that the sentiment involved ? if it be expressed with the least skill or tenderness ? will, in the popular apprehen sion, entirely overshadow these and cause them to

be practically forgotten. There is something in the

baby which is going to be a man or a woman, some

thing in its helplessness and in its occasional betrayal ? more and more each day

? which appeals with a

greater power than almost anything else to the chival ric sense and to the human sensibilities which are to be found in some degree in even the most hardened breasts. When to this is added the element of mother

hood ? as in the pictures of the Madonna and Child, for instance ? the attraction becomes irresistible.

In the picture by Mr. Dobson, which we engrave, the idea of motherhood is indicated only in the watch ful care and loving solicitude depicted in the coun tenance of the elder sister, who is giving

*' baby

" her

evening meal, and yet it is there. The instinct which was born with her is being rapidly developed, in the

U

" LOVE ME, LOVE MY DOG!" ?After Sir Joshua Reynolds.

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338 THE ALDINE.

care of the younger sister, toward its full manifes tation when she shall dandle on her knees a daughter. For the rest, the picture is painted with great skill and

expression, especially in regard to the faces. The

dawning tenderness and love, of which we have

spoken, are faithfully rendered in the face of the elder

maiden, while the baby's satisfaction with the bun which constitutes the solid part of its tea, and, in fact, with the whole situation, is admirably brought out.

Mr. Dobson is a painter of considerable strength and vigor of handling, simple in his methods of pro

f/ducing effects, and thoroughly conscientious. He had several characteristic pictures on exhibition at Phila

delphia, such as "Children's Children are the Crown of Old Men,"

" Nazareth," etc. The picture we en

grave is not only a thoroughly charming rustic scene, but is an excellent specimen of his work.

"LOVE ME, LOVE MY DOG."

It is not often we are called on to admire a more

charming picture of childhood than the one we give in this number of The Aldine. The sweet childish

face, with its abundant promise of future beauty, the unstudied grace of attitude, the roguish expression of the large, trustful eyes, added to the decided discom fort at his little mistress's too ardent caress, evidently depicted on the face of the dog, make up a whole of which any artist might be proud, and which it ought not to surprise us to be told was painted by a master none other than Sir Joshua Reynolds-?the "great Sir Joshua." It would be a thoroughly delightful picture, even if it had no history, and interesting, even if painted by any one besides the great English master.

There is, however, a little anecdote connected with the painting of the picture which lends it additional interest It is the portrait of Miss Bowles, when a

very little girl, and was painted by Sir Joshua in 1775, when fifty-two years old. The circumstance is re lated by Mr. Leslie, in Leslie and Taylor's

" Life and Times of Sir Joshua Reynolds : " The great painter had been invited to dine at the house of Mr. Bowles, and was much struck, while waiting for dinner, by the beauty of their young daughter, and by the pretty tableau she made when she flew to embrace her dog? as represented in the picture

? being a little shy of

the stranger, and expressed his admiration. Sir George Beaumont, who has furnished the anecdote to Mr.

Leslie, thereupon urged Mr. and Mrs. Bowles to have their daughter's portrait painted by their guest; but

they had intended to have her sit to Romney, and ob

jected to the proposition, urging that Sir Joshua's pic tures faded?which was true enough, as all who have seen the specimens in the Lenox collection can tes

tify. Sir George was urgent, however, and finally car ried his point, the parents consenting to commission Sir Joshua. The little maid was accordingly placed next him at dinner, and he exerted himself so suc

cessfully? for he was a great lover of and favorite with children ? then and subsequently, as to win her heart completely, and in a few days she went willingly to his studio and patiently gave the necessary sittings for this, one of the painter's most charming pictures, and, we are told, most successful portraits. It may be matter of interest to our readers to know that Sir

Joshua received fifty guineas?about $250?for the

picture, while the late Marquis of Hertford gave for it a thousand guineas.

ART IN LONDON AND PARIS.

In Trafalgar Square, London, and directly behind the great monument to Nelson, celebrated for its lions

modeled from designs by the late Sir Edwin Landseer, stands the National Gallery, the repository of the works of art belonging to the nation ? an unrivaled collec tion, surpassing by far the Musee du Louvre of Paris, not in numbers, but in quality. Where the Louvre shows several of one master, the National Gallery ex hibits but one : that one, though, is a gem. I do not mean to say by this that the collection of the Paris Mus?e is a secondary one : it is not. It is more com

plete in its exhibit of the schools of art than the gal lery in London ; but to the latter one must go to see

a master work of any particular artist. From the Teniers in the Louvre you receive but an indifferent idea of that master's ability, though there are many ; but an examination of the two or three in the London

gallery tells you immediately what that artist was. So with Van Dyck, Rubens (although the best Rubens are not in London), Hobbema, Ruysdael, Van Eyck (the inventor of oil painting), Holbein, Quentin Mat- j sys, and nearly all of the painters of the Flemish school. For the celebrated Italians there is no place like Rome and Florence.

But the great pride of the London National Gallery is the collection of Turners?his " Liber Studiorum

"

and the fine collection of large oil pictures. Standing before these latter, one can not help but admit the truth of Ruskin's claim that "Turner was the greatest landscape painter who ever lived." - Claude Lorraine is admitted to be great, perhaps the greatest before

Turner ; but certainly, upon beholding the two glori ous works of the latter master, placed by his desire between two Claudes, one must be but an indifferent student of art or lover of nature, not to be able to see that they go beyond the older master in all respects. All of Turner's pictures are not of the same high order. All are skillful; many would demand of the beholder a worship akin to idolatry of the master in order to claim for them a footing with the two above mentioned. But what a grand painter of water ! Cer

tainly he is without a rival, either among the old

painters or among the modern, for truth of color, form and motion, air, distance, light, particularly the last. His manner of putting or placing the color

upon canvas, is wonderful in confidence and knowl

edge of what is necessary, and the quickest means of

producing the effect, thereby preserving the purity of color. But, sad to say, Turner's pictures, I think, will have no other existence a century hence than in books. The two beautiful works mentioned are now as low toned, are even lower in tone ? that particular tone worked by time upon the substances comprising the picture

? than are those of Claude ; and some

others, especially those painted in a very light key ?

those having much white in them ? are cracked all

over; and large flakes have become detached and fallen between the picture and glass that covers it, which is curious, as those pictures containing much solid white are generally those that preserve the best with other masters; whereas, with Turner, the dark est or lowest toned works are those which show the least signs of decay. Upon what qualities of art the drawings of Mul

ready are esteemed I have failed entirely to find, as

productions of that class are seen every day better done in the ateliers of Paris and by boys. For years I have read of, and have heard from the lips of ama teurs who believe all they read of such illustrious names ? of the beauty and high artistic qualities of those red and black chalk drawings in the National

Gallery. It must be in their case the same as with

many other things, a matter of taste ? it certainly is not one of knowledge

? and the paintings by the same masters are below criticism as works of painters' art. A good engraving of them is far preferable, and

gives greater pleasure than looking at the originals. Who does not know the "Wolf and Lamb by the excellent engraving from this work ? Content your selves, my dear readers who have not seen it! You would be cruelly disappointed, for it is one of the weakest pieces of painting and color that one can find. Another by Collins, "Happy as a King," sometimes called "Rustic Glee," the engraving of which is worth the painting, I wish I could say as much for the painting that it was worth engraving. You say, when receiving a pair of shoes from your shoemaker, if they are badly done,

'' They are bad ;

the work is poor !" to the carpenter who does not understand his business,

'' Your work is clumsy and rude." So I say of this picture : the work is bad ?

as bad as anything which is claimed as something can be. Feeble in color, unlearned in manner ?

or,

rather, lacking entirely in style ? it gives a poor im

pression of the picture from which so pleasing a sub

ject as the steel engraving of the same was drawn ; and outside the idea of a subject for a picture, is en

tirely worthless. On the other hand, no engraving, no reproduction can give the beauty of David Wilkie, Reynolds, some of Gainsborough's, Hogarth, and the

lovely Rembrandts, and more than all others, the

chefs-d'oeuvre of Turner. These all leave far behind them the ablest, the subtlest skill of the engraver's art.

It is a great error, repeated in all the European na tions and believed in, that England has not had a school peculiar to herself, as had Italy, Spain, Bel

gium, Holland, and France. I repeat it, it is an error. England had as fine a school?a school just as serious, just as artistic, and in some respects much more natural than the contemporaneous schools.

Reynolds, Gainsborough, Wilson, Hogarth, Wilkie, Constable, as designers, as colorists, as painters and as storytellers, equal any of the schools of Europe, in some instances excel them, as in the case of Hogarth and Wilkie. No contemporary painter equaled them in any school of the world, nor, I might add, has done so since, in their particular genre. With one

exception ? Rembrandt ? none have surpassed the

vigorous painting and qualities of Reynolds's "Ban ished Lord."' What landscape painter of his time

surpassed Gainsborough, without counting his extra

ordinary ability as portrait painter ? an ability so im

mense that it is difficult to know which to place first, his portraits or landscapes.

But certainly the English school of to-day is the feeblest among all

? an infant giant learning to walk ?

making rapid and long strides toward its old bril

liancy though : witness Millais, Landseer, Turner, Faed, Frith ; and among the younger men, Small, Fildes, Aumonier, Boughton, Henry Moor, E. Leigh ton, etc., who certainly are men and artists calculated

to sustain and increase the tendency toward a glorious position among the modern schools of art One thing is evident: in England there is a healthy sentiment, and poetry. Her painters have a manner peculiar to themselves ; probably a little too romantic and not

sufficiently studied from nature ; but in the hands of the young school the future can not fail to be better.

Last year, when the new additions to the Gallery were completed, making now quite a fine, though not commodious repository, all the pictures were placed under glass, except the very largest, to preserve them from the fogs which are continual in London, and fill the finest edifices with their disagreeable effects. Some days, even, one can not see from one extremity to the other of a hall, as in the South Kensington

Museum, nor see the top of a dome, as in the read

ing-room of the British Museum, the fog is so thick. Not only is it inconvenient, but its effects are ruinous to works of art, especially paintings. It was a timely and kindly idea toward the preservation of many of the gems in the National Gallery, especially the Tur ners, which will not stand long under the restorer's hands.

How should France, for example, know better or otherwise of English art ? Thirty years ago an Eng lish picture had not crossed the Channel, and to-day there are but four in the Louvre ? one little gem of I a Constable, and two sketches by the same master. The fourth is a Bonnington, who, by the by, is claimed by the French as a French master; and so, properly speaking, there are but three English works in France, and they indifferent ones ; of a master, certainly, but no examples of his genius nor fair

specimens of his style. When I say in France, I mean to say in public museums, the only educational centres of a great nation for the people in such mat ters. There are, I believe, one or two others in pri vate collections but recently acquired. In this way was exhibited a Reynolds in the exhibition for the benefit of Alsace and Lorraine, in the palace of the

Corps Legislatif, nearly three years ago ; but it was

hung in a miserable place, high up and in the dark, so probably not ten people out of the thousands who visited the exposition saw it Unhappily, the masters of the early British school of painting are few, and their works are not numerous ; they are held mostly by the nobility of that kingdom, whose private collec tions are rich in gems of all schools.

Another young diva has made her appearance in

Paris, though not for the first time ; but this is the

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